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by ottermo



Category: Humans (TV)
Genre: Family, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, it’s another hugfest guys, this show puts people through far too much for the amount of hugs that get given
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-23
Updated: 2018-06-23
Packaged: 2019-05-27 12:53:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15025022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ottermo/pseuds/ottermo
Summary: Mattie returns to find her siblings very shaken by recent events.(the Hawkins children need so many hugs, okay)





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**Author's Note:**

> I... am still recovering from episode 6 and I have many, many complicated feelings about Laura’s choice. Mattie is going to voice some of them - the rest will have to wait for a meta essay. 
> 
> Anyway, I wanted to (a) explore Mattie as a linking factor between Anatole’s two weird experiments in binary and (b) make sure the three Hawkins kids got some hugs in, because they are all having a really bad day! 
> 
> Little bit of Leotilda to ease us in, too. Must admit I sort of forgot about Leo, who also needs the lowdown on the Sam Sitch, perhaps in a follow up chapter? We shall see. I’m staying off Twitter and tumblr ‘cause I don’t want to see episode 8 spoilers, which will probably force me to write just to pass the time.

They creep up to the house long after dark, and Mattie takes Leo by the hand before they reach the door, tugging him back.

“Not a word, okay?” she says. Deeper down she knows he wouldn’t dream of breaking the news to any of her family, but on the surface she is overwhelmed by a need to be absolutely sure of her control of the situation, certain that she’ll get to choose how it’s done.

If it’s done at all. She is acutely aware of the part of her that wants to tell no-one, as if not acknowledging it will somehow excuse her from making decisions she is nowhere close to ready for.

“Of course,” Leo murmurs, and gives her hand a squeeze. Mattie takes a deep breath, pulling as much strength from their contact as she can, then pulls her hand away to go for her house keys.

She lets them in, and she can make out the vague shape of her father, head slightly visible over the arm of the sofa, down the hall. For some reason, Stanley isn’t charging in his usual place, and thoughts of Mia’s arrest flit through her mind: what had happened at the commission, exactly? Had Mia only been arrested because of the bombing reported on the radio?

It’s really quite rude of so many other things to be happening at the same time as her own personal crisis, Mattie decides.

Together they climb the stairs, and Mattie notices on passing it that her mother’s door is slightly ajar.

“I’ll see you in a second,” she says to Leo, who nods and heads into her room.

She nearly does it - nearly opens the door, nearly goes in, ready to break down in her mother’s arms like she’s four years old again. But at the final moment her hand snaps back to her side - no, she can’t, not now, not this late, not this early.

She makes for her own room, finds Leo sat on the edge of the bed. Mattie goes to sit next to him and he stretches out an arm to hold her close at his side. She nestles against him, breathes out long and slow.

“We’ll be alright,” says Leo.

Mattie doesn’t know about that, so she says nothing, just listens to his heartbeat, tries to feel safe. She ought to try and sleep, probably, but neither of them move for several minutes - minds too busy sorting through the wreckage.

Mattie stirs at the sound of far-off muffled sobbing, sits up straighter.

“That’s Sophie,” she says, crossing to the door. It’s been a long while since her sister’s last bout of night terrors, but in the wake of Day Zero the whole family had learnt this sound well. In the smaller house they live in now it carries even more clearly between rooms.

She is baffled to find herself tripping over a bleary-eyed Toby as soon as she enters her sister’s bedroom, but spares little thought to him as she gathers a distraught Sophie in her arms.

“Hey, it’s okay. I’ve got you.”

Sophie is not just crying, Mattie realises, she’s repeating a word over and over, each time more anguished than the last. Not just a word, a name. _Sam_.

Mattie knows exactly what it’s like to dream about horrible things happening to your synthetic friends, be they hybrid or fully-fledged. It’s a dangerous world. But Sam is safer than most, downstairs in the living room, charging next to the window that looks out on his new trampoline. Not that Mattie’s checked, mind, but where else would he be?

“Sam’s okay, Soph. He’s fine, they can’t hurt him if he’s here with us. It was just a dream.”

Sophie doesn’t seem to hear her, and the only response is from Toby, who’s still here, for some reason.

“Mattie, you don’t…”

He’s on his feet now, having scrambled up from his unusual sleeping position, sitting up with his back leaning against the wall. 

“You weren’t here,” he says. “Let me.”

Confused, Mattie loosens her grip on Sophie, who flings herself into Toby’s arms instead. Mattie’s hands dangle uselessly at her sides as she watches Toby attempt to soothe their sister, and she notices with a pang that he’s doing a much better job of it than she had. This isn’t how it usually happens - Toby’s pretty good, as big brothers go, but Mattie’s always secretly prided herself on Sophie’s idolisation of her ‘badass big sister’. Usually it’s Toby who’s left looking on while Mattie comes to the rescue.

And it would be pretty nice if she could feel motherly right now, rather than the sparest of spare parts.

As Sophie quietens, Mattie looks questioningly at Toby.

“What happened?” she asks in a low voice.

He doesn’t answer her, but glances at the door. Mattie gets the message, and waits for him out in the hall, feeling her chest tighten with worry. Somehow, this isn’t just a nightmare. What the hell can have happened to Sam? Had he wandered off again, in search of Karen? No, her father would be out looking still. Unless that’s where Stanley is?

Eventually Toby creeps out of the room, but his face is not open to her questions. He looks almost angry with her, and Mattie folds her arms in defence.

“You should have been here,” he says.

“I don’t even know what happened,” Mattie protests. “Was it the bombing? Are they rounding up synths, how did they even know Sam was here?”

Toby shakes his head and leans against the wall. For the first time in years Mattie wonders if she’s about to see her brother cry - an activity both have carefully hidden from one another since long before the Elsters first came into their lives.

“ _Toby_ ,” she says, softer. “What’s going on? You can’t just not tell me. Where’s Sam? Is he… alive?”

“Yes,” says Toby, and Mattie feels just a little of the tension ease inside her.

“Then where is he?” she presses.

“He…” Toby stands up straight again, clears his throat. “It started with Stanley, he’s… conscious.”

“He’s _what_ now?”

“He wasn’t really an orange eyes. He was… I dunno, a spy or something. Working for — you know, the doctor at Max’s camp.”

Mattie’s eyes open wide. “Anatole?”

“That’s him.”

“Why would Anatole need a spy?”

Toby’s voice is hollow, pained. “Because he’s some kind of psycho, I don’t know. He hates humans.”

“No,” says Mattie, “There must be some mistake. Anatole’s… he looked after Leo for a whole year, he…”

“He hates humans,” Toby repeats. “He doesn’t believe any of us see them as equals.”

“Bullshit,” Mattie says, “I _know_ Anatole.”

“Yeah, about as much as we knew Stanley.”

Mattie cannot reconcile the idea that Anatole - calm, and kind, and well-meaning for all he could sometimes be less than tactful - the idea that Max’s most trusted confidante, after Flash and Mia, could possibly be anything but the saint he’d always seemed… it doesn’t make sense. She thinks back to the day Max had unplugged Leo: Anatole had even asked him if he was sure, hadn’t seemed half as convinced as Max that it was the only thing to be done… had he?

“I… thought I knew him,” she amends. “So, what did he do? Was he here?”

“Yeah.” Toby shudders. “He was trying to prove to Stanley that we weren’t, that he shouldn’t trust us. He had this… old man…”

Mattie could hear his voice rising slightly, growing tighter and… angrier?

“He put Sam and this old man next to each other and he said Mum had to choose one to die.”

“ _What_ ,” Mattie says, disbelieving. “Why?

“To show Stanley… well, to show _us_ , to show Mum that she… he said he knew who she would choose, that we could never choose them over our own kind…”

Mattie feels a chill run through her, and her heart aches for her mother, having to make such an impossible, senseless decision.

“Surely she couldn’t choose either,” Mattie says, “That’s the whole point. What kind of… why would he do that?”

“Because he was _right_ ,” Toby chokes out. “He was right, she chose Sam, she saved the man, she…”

She can’t understand the words after that, listens to him sob out sounds as she stands there, unmoving, the coldness in her chest spreading out until she’s frozen all over, the horror of it filling her. Not her mother, never her mother, not after everything they’ve been through. And not _Sam_. Nothing about this can be real, because Mattie doesn’t live in this world, where her mother can sentence a child to death. It isn’t… that can’t happen, it can’t.

She half expects to feel tears stinging her own eyes, but instead she is numb. Parched of all moisture, cut off even from the air.

“You said Sam was alive,” she manages to say.

Toby takes a steadying breath. “He is. He went with Anatole.”

“Then the whole thing was just…”

“Pointless,” Toby finishes. “Only it wasn’t, because...he knew what she would do. He knew her better than we did.”

Mattie tries to imagine them watching it all play out - her father and siblings, willing her mother to order the death of a stranger under their own roof, in front of Sophie, no less.

“She couldn’t win,” she murmurs.

For all it seems alien, there’s a faint trace of familiarity about Toby’s story. Mattie wracks her brain, trying to pin it down. Suddenly Max is there in her mind: that dark memory of him she’s tried to block out. _It’s a choice between the possibility of his death, and the certainty of hers._

“She called his bluff,” Mattie says, trying hard to believe it. “She knew… or she _hoped_ … that he wouldn’t kill Sam. Of the two of them, if Anatole hates humans... then Sam had the best chance of mercy.”

She remembers all too well how betrayed she’d felt on Leo’s behalf, back when Max had reduced his brother’s life to a stake of probability. It doesn’t make her mother’s choice much easier to swallow, but…

“Oh my God,” Mattie says, voice dull with the realisation. “Anatole has done this exact thing before. In a… kind of way. He made Max choose between Leo and this other synth who was dying. At the time he made it seem like Max had come up with it, but…”

But Max would never have leapt to that conclusion, except at Anatole’s word that Christabel had no other hope.

They had all been played, Max most of all. And now her mother too. Mattie feels sick, her head is spinning as a year’s worth of details fall into place. Anatole had made himself indispensable. She remembers overhearing Mia and Flash voicing it as a concern, not long after the election. But Anatole was always… there, always helpful and measured and so _wise_. They had all grown to trust him. How many whispered discussions had Mattie pretended not to hear, sitting at Leo’s bedside when Max came to vent to Anatole? And, worse, how many times had Max appeared at the door and beckoned Anatole away, to consult him out of Mattie’s earshot?

Now she thinks about it, there’s been a definite pattern. Mattie even remembers smiling once upon seeing the four of them: Max, Anatole, Mia and Flash, sitting round the table and earnestly discussing plans, the very picture of cooperation and mutual respect.

And now Mia’s in police custody, under suspicion of hate crimes against humanity - Mia, who’s so gentle and full of compassion. They could destroy her, easily. Max and Flash, Mattie can only presume, are still at the railyard. Do they know? Had Anatole managed to slip away to play his torturous games without them noticing?

“Toby, I know this is bad...” Mattie starts.

“No, don’t,” Toby says, “Don’t make excuses for her. You weren’t here, you didn’t _see_. She didn’t have to say his name. She could have—”

“Could have what?” Mattie challenges. “Do you really think he would have taken ‘neither’ as an answer?”

“No, but… but it was _Sam_ ,” Toby says, outrage muted by heartbreak.

“I know,” says Mattie sadly. She regards him, notes that he is still shaking, reliving it. “And I know we never do this, but…”

She opens her arms just slightly and he doesn’t even hesitate, which actually makes it worse somehow, she thinks as she hugs him tight. Maybe she really should have been here. The idea of Sophie and Toby and Sam facing something like this while she…  

Well, maybe none of them have had the best day in the world, but she can’t bear this, Toby hasn’t seemed so young since before he was half her height.

“Did Soph go back to sleep?” she murmurs.

“Not that I saw,” he says. “I had to… you had to know.”

She pulls back and gives his shoulders a squeeze. “Yeah. Thanks for telling me.”

She leads him back into Sophie’s room, finds her baby sister staring at them both with wide, scared eyes. Mattie sits on the bed, pulls Toby with her. Sophie sidles closer and Mattie drapes an arm around each of them.

“I’m sorry, Soph,” Mattie says. “If there’s any way of getting him back… we’ll find it.”

“He won’t love us anymore,” Sophie says miserably.

“He will,” says Mattie.

She feels Sophie’s sighing breath, and it’s quaint somehow, the way Mattie can pick out the mixture of cynicism and weary resignation. Quaint but sickening: Sophie is eight years old. She shouldn’t be dealing with things like this, she should be easy to reassure, not hardened by despair.

“I love you guys, you know that?” Mattie says into the half-dark. They are illuminated only by Sophie’s nightlight, a feeble yellow glow like dying hope.

Sophie reaches up to wrap her arms around Mattie’s neck. It’s a little suffocating, but Mattie finds such solace in having them both close. If it’s going to be hard to breathe anyway, it might as well be because of this.


End file.
